RADAR Altimeter

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One of the difficulties with telemetry or altitude hold for a UAV(especially helicopter) is accurate altitude readings. Has anyone experimented with using RADAR altitude detection or is this something that is beyond the hobbyist?

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My guess is that it's definitely expensive. They make you request a price quote and don't have any pricing info on their website. Do you think it's possible to make a device to measure altitude using radar? Maybe adapt a radar gun sensor from measuring doppler shift(speed) to measuring distance?

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I was also thinking a radar gun would be a possible donor for the project. But I believe they all rely on the doppler effect (which does not readily offer distance measurements on static objects). We would want pulse echo ranging in order to get that sort of data.

The big issue is that you would have to rewrite the firmware. Perhaps dropping in a new microcontroller is all that is required, but I would expect some circuitry remodeling would be needed. The good news is that some of the hardware in the gun should be salvageable.

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The acoustical method (ultrasound) might not work well in many R/C aircraft applications. It often will not work if there is excessive vibration or noise. Also, even under ideal situations, ranging is limited to a few dozen feet.

However, for quiet settings that need a few feet of ranging, ultrasound is king. It is very popular in robotics. It all depends on the exact application; I would imagine that in a nitro powered model, the radar method might be a better choice.